Saturday, March 31, 2007

American is not an epithet

I want to thank my friend Amil for his response on the post below dedicated to his vision. There was a time whan most of us took pride in being American. There were always far left subversives and racial power nuts, but the vast majority of us considered Americanism as a source of pride.

The far left likes to talk about xenophobia. Now to those who are stupid this is not the fear of Xena. America does not need lectures from Europeans or leftists about foreigners. Even in a remote section of VT I can visit several Chinese stores and a Pakistani gas station. One of the motels is owned by an Indian and this is a isolated section. If I were in NYC with UI or Jason I could visit almost every ethnic group except for Native American. I would have to travel a few hundred miles and I could visit a reservation if I had a reason. Americans do not need lectures about internationalism from Euros.

However, Americanism is more than a word it is commitment to our country or values.In America we do not need lectures about freedom as we live it. Even the typical complaints from the far left are mostly trivial, gay marriage and Falwell or Robertson's stupidity of the week.

Amil takes pride in America and it is obvious in his writings that he values our ideals and freedoms. It is important for many of you to understand Persia had a history of tolerance long before it was fashionable elsewhere. Islam itself enters Persia by conquest and imposed an alien culture of intolerance. This may seem odd but at one point the Mongols viewed the system of bigoted Islamic Jim Crow laws to be barbaric and eliminated them.

The other amusing anecdote is Euros calling Americans inbred. Many of us are multi ethnic especially Uptown Steve who is also partially white and Native American. I think Mr Beamish has around three or four ethnicities and Warren roughly the same.I am one of the few that has just one ethnicity.

Amil reminds all of us of the pride that the vast majority of immigrants used to feel upon arrival. My grandparents considered being an American an honor. One sees the same spirit in your Korean businessman or your Indian IT professional. Even amongst immigrants the gulf between legal and illegal is wide.

There are exceptions to this pride in being America. One can look at a Peace Protest and see Communists and Muslim extreemists. Communists by definition are parasites and advocate the violent overthrow of our govenment. Revolutionary defeatism is a tactic that dates back to Lenin.

The main problem presented by over the top rhetoric by Muslims at protests and in some of the Mosques is free speech does not include criminal acts. If you are upset about cartoons or satire protest or even make your own satire. Making violent threatsis not free speech and should be prosecuted. My problem is that this country hasn't prosecuted anyone for treason or sedition in a long time.

I am an American and this is something I state with pride. My brothers and sisters come in all races, religions and ethnicities, some even wear gasmasks. Amil has embraced our spirit better than many of those who were born here.

I learned to love and appreciate this country by having to spend most of my childhood overseas. When you see the poverty and repression everywhere else, it becomes almost unimaginable that there are people who live in this great country who hate it so deeply. And the basis for that hatred lies in pure ignorance. Ignorance of what the real, and not imagined, alternatives are.

I've never known anything but love for my country. But living in NYC, any sign of patriotism is met with slightly raised eyebrows and the instant connection with the American flag with evil. I've actually gotten dirty looks on the street by carrying a small rolled up flag home from the store or let alone wearing one like the time I had an American flag pin on my hat during the first Gulf War. This woman [and I use the term loosely] inches from my face gave me a look that could kill up and down. You could FEEL the hate. I am surrounded by the knee jerk America-is-to-blame-for-everything crowd.

If you want to see some true patriots, come on over to my place. I shot the Rally Against Islamo-Fascism at Ground Zero yesterday.

We've all heard most of the charges against Kerik and his boss, the security "expert" who sent NYC first responders into the towers with radio equipment that was inadequate, but htis one is pretty choice. Hadn't heard it.

"About a year earlier, Pirro, then the Westchester County district attorney, ordered the A&P supermarket chain to hire the Giuliani-Kerik security firm as part of a settlement agreement in a case involving underage alcohol sales. The security firm was ultimately paid $43,000."

Of all the security firms in all the towns in all the world, she just happens to order them to hire Bada & Bing, Inc?

Bernie's trial on extortion, tex evasion and obstruction is coming at a most inopportune time for Rudy "My Three Wives" Giuliani. Can anything but a plague of squeegee men save his candidacy?

There is one co-worker who's been in our country since he was 13 years old (now in his 40s). Growing up here he has learn to play the bigotry card, but one day I got him to admit that any animosity between ethnic groups here is negligible compared to the deep-seated hatred for foreigners where he comes from. Most eventually admit how welcome they feel in America.

My favorite story was a fellow graduate student (in the 1970s) who noted we have had racial strife while boasting that in his country people of all ethnic groups and religions get along. I told him I was ignorant of his country but I had doubts that harmony and tolerance was universally shared anywhere including his country, Yugoslavia. Time proved me right! After that I’ve come to distrust claims by people from other nations unless I grill them sufficiently.

urban infidel, what you say is very disheartening. Check out Evan Sayet's blog, you'll be amazed. New York, Jewish, Liberal who found conservatism after 9/11...and HE used to write for Bill Maher. THE MOST amazing video on youtube I've seen yet. Let's hope the mainstream media ALLOWS him to be heard because he slams liberalism up one side and down the other. I strongly doubt it. After all, we can't know what THEY Don't want us to know.....

Remember when Phil Donohue welcomed Tom Brokaw for an interview after 9/11 and quite literally sighed a great sigh of relief that Brokaw wasn't wearing a little American flag on his lapel? He mentioned that and they both smiled their smug, America-hating smiles....SURE, they LOVE America, don't they? As long as it's Socialist, keeping the truth from Americans, and guaranteeing 13 year olds private adoptions.

There's also been a lot of hate directed at NYC for many years. I'll never forget it, just a few days after the attacks on 9/11, CNN had an interview with some mid-Westerners and such to ask them if their opinion of NYC had changed since the terror assault. I mean, I couldn't believe what I was watching.. the smoke was still pouring out of that wreckage and there was this smug panel of my fellow Americans discussing New Yorkers as if we were from another galaxy and had by default of our our existence committed some kind of affront to rest of the country. Pretty tasteless.. but then again, it was SO typical of CNN trying to find some divisiveness during a national crisis.

There is some of it up here in the North Country. However, the locals are touchy about 9-11 cracks. I was in a local store when some Canadians made a comment.

The local police officer told me not to say a word and leave it to him. The local police officer told the kids thank you for shopping in town pay and be on your way. The petrified punks did as they were told.

About Me

I am a Rudy Republican . The
peril of being a moderate is
that at times you get hit from
both sides. Some say I am at the edge of the great GOP tent. Radical leftists call me a rightwing extreemist.Yet in the end all we can ever be
is ourselves.